Chapter 1
He looked out through the bug-stained windshield at the plump moon. Shadowy continents and dry oceans covered the florescent globe that seemed to float above them as they sped along the country road. The moon’s ominous light turned grass that should have been green and a sign that he knew was yellow to shades of grey as if their images were being captured in the aperture of a movie camera loaded with black and white film. A dark cloud drifted across the sky and slowly obscured the moon. Out beyond the headlights, the visible world ended at the edge of the beams’ reach causing him to let up on the accelerator.
In this low light Lee imagined that even blood would appear black. Soon, they would know.
He pulled the truck as far off the road as possible, up close to the trunks of the low hanging trees lining the gravel shoulder that crunched beneath the tires. He cut the ignition and the engine noise died; he pressed the headlight switch, killing them. The canopies of the trees wrapped the truck in a darkness, which combined with the lack of sound, made him feel like they had entered a lifeless vacuum; but, finally, the feel of the cool breeze against his elbow leaning out of the open driver’s door window, began to bring the world back. Then, as if slowly turning up the volume, the noises of the night gradually filled the emptiness.
Are we really going to do this? Lee’s hand shook as he reached up and unsnapped the plastic cover of the dome light and removed the bulb. He took a deep breath into his tight chest, held it for several seconds, and slowly exhaled. “Are you ready?” he asked his partner.
“Yea, I’m freakin’ ready. Let’s do it, man. Let’s blow these sons of bitches away!”
Even though the night air was cool, Lee felt a trickle of warm sweat run down the back of his neck. Donnie was no mental giant and right now he was obviously pumped up with adrenaline. Lee could not tolerate mistakes, not tonight. “Follow my lead and we’ll get in and out. We stick to the plan. Okay?”
Lee felt humiliated that this—this moron’s actions could determine his future. There is no way I’m going back to jail if Donnie screws this up. But he realized that he had no choice but to do this job and he needed help. With the money it would pay, he could get his life back … and his daughter.
“Yea, man. Don’t worry. I’m cool.”
Lee reached down and grabbed the wooden stock of his 12 gauge pump shotgun. As he opened the door, he smelled sweet gun oil. Donnie got out on the passenger side, a double-barreled shotgun in his hands. He closed the door a little too loudly and Lee shushed him, and whispered: “Quiet!” Their eyes were beginning to adjust to the low light; objects appeared like ghosts around them, then slowly came into focus.
They moved through the grass that felt like damp and dirty shag carpeting beneath their boots, and kept to the shadows as they worked their way along the boundary of the plowed field and trees, parallel to the house, where their prey waited.
The house sat back a hundred yards or so from the road with a long, straight, gravel driveway running through an open front yard to the main entrance. The old-style, white farmhouse, its porch running across the front and wrapping around the far side, stood in the center of at least thirty acres of mostly open farm land. The middle acre held the house surrounded by a grassy yard with several large oak trees out front, one in the back, and a barn off to the left rear. Thick woods lined the circumference of the fields. Across the road more plowed acreage stood ready for planting the fall crop.
Lee and Donnie paused along the edge of the woods as they came abreast of the house. They surveyed the open seventy-five yards or more they would have to cross to reach it, leaving the shadowy protection of the trees. Lee listened to the night, the damn crickets, and the soft whining of a jetliner soaring a mile high overhead. As he looked up at a faint flashing light moving slowly across the sky, Lee wondered what those passengers up there were doing. Were they watching some new sequel to Chevy Chase’s Vacation movie? Were they sipping their five dollar beers and discussing the latest trends on Wall Street? He wished he could fly off to Los Angeles or Seattle or Tokyo, anywhere but here. But no, he wasn’t that lucky. He pushed the thoughts away and regained his focus.
No cars moved along the road. They had seen the interior lights go out in the house an hour ago as they drove past the third time. They had been watching the house for a week, and thankfully, the family followed pretty much the same evening routine. At 10:00 p.m. they turned off the lights and went to bed. Lee hoped everyone was asleep by now. The nearest other home was a half mile west so he didn’t think they would be interrupted while doing the job.
“Well?” asked Donnie. “Are we going to do this freakin’ thing?”
Excerpt from Chapter 2
* * *
They stepped up to the side of the house and leaned their backs against the white painted wood siding. They waited and listened. Then Lee caught sight of movement farther back along the woods at the edge of the field. He could just make out shadows of several slowly moving objects. A break in the clouds lit the night. But Lee knew that even in this light, he and Donnie still would be hard to detect, especially if they moved slowly and hung to the shadows. Looking back across the field, he made out the dark outline of a group of four or five deer that had wandered out into the open along the grassy edge of the field to feed. He sighed.
* * *
Deputy Harold Priestly turned onto Riker’s Road and headed south. Another boring night, he thought. He needed to get off second shift. After eight o’clock, this county turned into a graveyard. Other than the occasional group of teenagers driving around smashing mailboxes or getting drunk at the lake on weekends, it was pretty much the same thing every night: cruise around and try to stay awake while nothing happened.
* * *
Lee whispered to Donnie, “Let’s go, back door.” They worked their way along the side and turned to the back of the house. A four foot high child’s plastic playhouse stood in the backyard twenty feet from the kitchen window where a mother could wash the dishes and watch the children play.
Donnie slipped a small spray can of lubricating oil from his pocket and sprayed the hinges on the screen door. He waited a few seconds and slowly opened the door, which made no sound, and held it for Lee.
Lee first tried the doorknob to see if they’d gotten lucky. No, it was locked. He removed the small pry bar from the right thigh pocket of his camouflaged trousers. Silently slipping it between the door and the frame, he applied pressure and leaned against the door. With a soft crack, the door opened. If there had been a deadbolt installed it would have been a little more difficult and noisier, but nothing they wouldn’t have been able to handle. With the door opened slightly, he took the oilcan from Donnie and sprayed the exposed inner door’s hinges through the small gap along the door jam. He opened the door and stepped into the kitchen.
Lee felt the high of adrenaline flowing through his veins. He had killed twice before and he remembered the rush of power he’d felt each time. His first victim had been sanctioned by the President in October of 1983 on the small island of Grenada. He still remembered the dead soldier’s eyes staring lifelessly up at the blue Caribbean sky.
His second experience as an assassin was shooting the son of a bitch who’d been screwing his ex-old lady. Lee thought about the eight years in the joint he’d done paying for that one. Not this time. They would do this job and be gone. He had thought this out and planned every detail carefully. Unlike the last time, this wasn’t an angry reaction of finding two people screwing in his bed.
He looked back at Donnie and motioned with his head. “Check the living room,” he whispered. He held a finger to his lips. “Quiet.”
Donnie nodded and slowly moved off through the door to the right, his gun held in a ready position.
Lee stepped off for the other door leading into the dining room.
* * *
“Sally, it’s Harold. Anything exciting going on?” He released the transmit button on his radio microphone.
The second shift dispatcher at the county police station turned down the volume on her small TV and pressed her transmit button. “Nothing happenin’ around here, Harold. I just saw on the news there was a convenience store hold-up in Cincinnati, though.” She released the button and smiled.
“They get all the luck,” said the deputy. “Let me know if a cat gets caught up a tree or anything important like that.”
“I thought that was the fire department’s job,” she called back.
“Not a chance. You give me that call. I’ve got to have something to keep me awake.”
“That call is yours when it comes. I feel so safe knowing you’re out there protecting us, Harold. Wanna have breakfast after shift?”
“Sounds good. Talk to you later.” He replaced the mic on its dashboard clip and pulled off the side of the road near an intersection. Maybe someone would run the stop sign. He could only hope.
